How to: Open ports for Apple TV to work

Apple TV requires some ports to be open to be able to sync and activate with the Apple Servers. If the ports are not configured properly, you might have the following errors:

Activation: Failed
Date/Time: Skipped (Reachable)

The ports needed for an Apple TV to work are:

– TCP Port 123 (Time server)
– TCP Port 3689 (iTunes)
– UDP Port 5353 (Bonjour Service)
– TCP Port 80 (Web)
– TCP Port 443 (SSL)
– TCP Port 53 (DNS)

If the problem still persists, one can also setup the DNS specific to the Apple service which are:

Preferred – 208.122.23.22
Alternate – 208.122.23.23

This can be done by switching the DNS to manual and typing in the DNS addresses.